Tobruk: Battalion Combat Series

Started by MengJiao, October 07, 2020, 02:50:09 PM

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MengJiao

  Technically the game is called "Brazen Chariots"...which is a great name and a fine book, but not terribly informative at first glance, though it does (like the massive official histories devoted to memorializing the Commonwealth forces in the Crusader Battles) teach you that the US Stuart Tank was a wonderful thing in late 1941...However, as a devote of the ups and downs of the Imperial forces in the Mediterranean in 1941, "Tobruk" pretty much covers things.  Yet on the other hand...despite great hopes for the BCSeries in covering the Tobruk battles, things just have not been all that exciting so far.  It's true that playing solo can put some strain on expectations for the excitement index, but really, Rommel in the desert should be pretty interesting most of the time.  Okay...so I'm fixing up the game a little to add some bells and whistles...mostly 3 turns a day.  The system allows two moves/activations a day by a formation and both are rather generic daylight turns.  Adding a night turn along with some more intense fatigue rules should make things scary for the cardboard world.  But wait, you say, that means that theoretically an infantry battalion on good roads could hike almost 50 miles in a day if all went well and the enemy stayed home.  True, but they would not go far the next day and not be able to attack or defend while hiking 50 miles.  So 3 turns a day...morning (most units have a good chance of a low SNAFU start), Afternoon (things get less SNAFU-free and fatigue goes up) and Night (essentially only Commonwealth or Imperial infantry can do anything at night so we will see how that works..with a high chance of SNAFU and lots of Fatigue)...Anyway the image shows Rommel's 5th Light and its opponents in Rommel's first battles at Tobruk (4 Australian Bdes, lots of Punjabi Scouts, AC and Herr Gott's Support Group -- the support group and one of the Bdes aren't in the image):


MengJiao

Quote from: MengJiao on October 07, 2020, 02:50:09 PM
   So 3 turns a day...morning (most units have a good chance of a low SNAFU start), Afternoon (things get less SNAFU-free and fatigue goes up) and Night (essentially only Commonwealth or Imperial infantry can do anything at night so we will see how that works..with a high chance of SNAFU and lots of Fatigue)...Anyway the image shows Rommel's 5th Light and its opponents in Rommel's first battles at Tobruk (4 Australian Bdes, lots of Punjabi Scouts, AC and Herr Gott's Support Group -- the support group and one of the Bdes aren't in the image):

   Morning April 12, the Axis forces have their troops (plus about 8 extra battalions) two days early and Trento breaches the wire and Ariete drives in and takes pretty heavy loses (probably mostly from 25 pdrs firing 20 pd AT rounds with full charges -- they are in the AT support modes the designers say):



   

MengJiao

Quote from: MengJiao on October 08, 2020, 07:08:13 PM

   Morning April 12, the Axis forces have their troops (plus about 8 extra battalions) two days early and Trento breaches the wire and Ariete drives in and takes pretty heavy loses (probably mostly from 25 pdrs firing 20 pd AT rounds with full charges -- they are in the AT support modes the designers say):


  Morning April 13 -- I think my 3 turns a day thing is working -- the Australians are pretty fatigued.  The light Division is across the wire at one point and so is the Trento Motorized.  Ariete was across but got pushed back after taking losses that would have been about 50% of what Ariete really had in April 1941.  I've beefed them and the Light Division up to keep the battle going.  So now I'll see if the fatigued and SNAFU-ridden Australians can be driven back by the extra Axis troops who weren't there yet in early April:


MengJiao

Quote from: MengJiao on October 10, 2020, 05:22:42 PM
Quote from: MengJiao on October 08, 2020, 07:08:13 PM

   Morning April 12, the Axis forces have their troops (plus about 8 extra battalions) two days early and Trento breaches the wire and Ariete drives in and takes pretty heavy loses (probably mostly from 25 pdrs firing 20 pd AT rounds with full charges -- they are in the AT support modes the designers say):


  Morning April 13 -- I think my 3 turns a day thing is working -- the Australians are pretty fatigued.  The light Division is across the wire at one point and so is the Trento Motorized.  Ariete was across but got pushed back after taking losses that would have been about 50% of what Ariete really had in April 1941.  I've beefed them and the Light Division up to keep the battle going.  So now I'll see if the fatigued and SNAFU-ridden Australians can be driven back by the extra Axis troops who weren't there yet in early April:

   I guess maybe the game works all too well -- much to my horror, despite some Australian SNAFUs, Ariete suffered horrendous losses and I'm giving up (as did Rommel historically) on bouncing Tobruk with fairly slender forces.